Understanding Context · Environment, Language, and Information Architecture by Hinton, Andrew -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Understanding Context: Environment, Language, and Information Architecture Praise for Understanding Context Foreword Preface

The Practical Bit Who Should Read This Book? So This Book Teaches Methods for Designing Context? Why Information Architecture? What Will You Learn from This Book? A Tour Through the Book’s Six Parts The Personal Bit

Acknowledgments I. The Context Problem

1. Everything, Yet Something

Birds in Trees, Words in Books Scenario: Andrew Goes to the Airport Breaking It Down

2. A Growing Challenge

Early Disruptions The Role of the Web Case Study: Facebook Beacon

3. Environments, Elements, and Information

A Wall and a Field A Conventional Definition of Context A New, Working Definition of Context Modes of Information Starting from the Bottom

II. Physical Information

4. Perception, Cognition, and Affordance

Information of a Different Sort A Mainstream View of Cognition Embodied Cognition: An Alternative View Action and the Perceptual System Information Pickup Affordance

Affordance is a revolutionary idea Affordances are value-neutral Perception of affordance information comes first; our ideas about it come later Affordances exist in the environment whether they are perceived or not Affordances are there, whether they are perceived accurately or not Affording information is always in a context of other information Affordances are learned

Directly Perceived versus Indirectly Meaningful Soft Assembly “Satisficing” Umwelts

5. Attention, Control, and Learning

A Spectrum of Conscious Attention Environmental Control Memory, and Learning the Environment

What is Memory? Types of Memory An Embodied Perspective on Memory Learning and Remembering versus Memory Learning and Remembering are Entangled with Environment Environment, and Explicit versus Implicit Memory

What Does All This Mean for Design?

6. The Elements of the Environment

Invariants

Examples of Invariants Variants Compound Invariants Invariants Are Not Only About Affordance Digital Invariants

The Principle of Nesting

Nesting versus Hierarchy Digital Environments and Nesting

Surface, Substance, Medium

Digital Examples

Objects

Phenomenology and Objects Manipulating and Sorting Objects with Agency Digital Objects

Layout

Digital Layout

Events

Affordances and Laws for Events Events and Time Digital Events

Place

Digital Places

7. What Humans Make

The Built Environment The Social Environment Meaning, Culture, and “Product”

III. Semantic Information

8. How Language Works

Looking at Language Signs: Icons, Indexes, and Symbols

Icons Indexes Symbols

The Superpowers of Symbols Signification Conflation Language Is Contextual

9. Language as Infrastructure

Language and the Body Structure of Speech The Role of Metaphor Visual Information Semantic Function Tools for Understanding Semantic Architecture

10. The Written Word

The Origins of Writing What Writing Does The Structure of Writing Rules and Systems

11. Making Things Make Sense

Language and “Sensemaking” Physical and Semantic Intersections

Digital Intersections

Physical and Semantic Confusion Ducks, Rabbits, and Calendars

IV. Digital Information

12. Digital Cognition and Agency

Shannon’s Logic Digital Learning and Agency Everyday Digital Agents Ontologies

13. Digital Interaction

Interfaces and Humans Semantic Function of Simulated Objects Modes and Meaning

14. Digital Environment

Variant Modes and Digital Places Foraging for Information Inhabiting Two Worlds at Once Ambient Agents

V. The Maps We Live In

15. Information as Architecture

Contemplating “Cyberspace” Architecture + Information Expansive IA About Definitions

16. Mapping and Placemaking

Maps and Territory What Makes Places Railroads, Chickens, and Captain Vancouver

Atlanta Vancouver

Organizational Maps

17. Virtual and Ambient Places

Of Dungeons and Quakes The Porous Nature of Cyberplaces Augmented and Blended Places The Map That Makes Itself Metamaps and Compasses

18. The Social Map

Conversation Social Architectures “Proxemics” as a Structural Model Identity Collisions and Fronts The Ontology of Self Networked Publics

VI. Composing Context

19. Arrangement and Substance

Composition in Other Disciplines Qualities of Composition Something to Walk On

20. The Materials of Semantic Function

Elements Labels and Ontology Relationships and Taxonomy Rules and Choreography The Organization as Medium

21. Narratives and Situations

People Make Sense Through Stories Intentions and Intersections The Tales Organizations Tell Situations over Goals

22. Models and Making

A Fresh Look at Our Methods Observing Context Perspectives and Journeys Structures for Tacit Satisficing Blueprints, Floor Plans, Bubbles, and Blobs

A. Coda B. About the Author C. Understanding Context Index About the Author Copyright

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